There are 3 reasons we did not speak up about my dish/send it back:

1) After taking our order the waiter was not seen again until the end of the meal to clear our dishes and deliver the bill. I would have had to get up during the meal and track him down which would have been uncomfortable/awkward. Traditionally, a waiter comes by 5-10 minutes after a meal is served to "check in" and see if anything else is needed. I might have asked for some salt or additional seasonings if he had. As he was clearing our plates, he asked how we enjoyed our meal. My husband said, "Some of it was good," and we both frowned at my (still full) pasta dish. The waiter did not inquire further. He looked as if he understood that I did not like my dish and did not ask me if I wanted to take the leftovers home.

2) I don't think my post "trashes" the restaurant. We just didn't care for the pasta there. My husband enjoyed his antipasti just fine and while he found his pasta to also be bland, did eat it.

3) My husband is MORTIFIED of any type of verbalized criticism while we are eating out. He would NEVER send a dish back EVER. When I told him about this post, he said, "They didn't mess the dish up in any way (e.g. overcook it or undercook it), it was just a shitty dish." And by "shitty" he means, not to our taste. Does one send something back simply because hey don't care for it? In my husband's opinion, you just suck it up, pay the $26, and call it a day. Just because it was not to my liking doesn't mean that it is not to someone else's.

Cheers.

We have wanted to eat at Rialto ever since seeing Jody Adams on Top Chef Masters. We ate in the bar. There was only one waiter working the bar area and he was rushed and distracted at best. We ordered:

Me (vegan):
CHICKPEA PASTA: peppers, eggplant, chickpeas, garlic, and saffron ($26). The pasta itself was interesting. My hubby didn't care for the texture, but I thought it was fine. What wasn't fine was the total BLANDNESS of the dish. It was boring, boring, boring. Since the pasta essentially had no taste, the sauce needed to be peppy, complex, and incredibly flavorful. It was not. I ate 2 bites and declared the dish not even worth eating. I think this is only the second time in my life that I have ever not eaten a dish that I have ordered. What a shame, especially at this price point ($26).

Him (vegetarian):
PAN ROASTED BROCCOLI: evoo, pecorino ($5) = good.
SEARED ENDIVE: pomegranate, honey ($5) = awesome.
VEGGIE PENNE: mushrooms, brussel sprouts, squash, kale pesto, parmesan cream ($14) = mediocre. Also, incredibly boring (snore!). My hubby described this dish as "pasta 101" and we both agreed that we make penne better at home.

The dishes were dropped off by someone other than our waiter and our waiter only returned to our table when it was time for the bill. We were never served dinner rolls with our meal and when I asked him about this, he told me that he could bring us some. At this point, we were already long done with dinner and plotting what other restaurant we would go to so that I could get something to eat.

If you are vegetarian, my advice would be to order off the Antipasti menu. If you are vegan, I suggest you go elsewhere.

We did see Jody Adams in person so that was pretty cool!

I have been trying to transition to a vegan diet and have been finding this REALLY difficult in Boston. I do not expect restaurants to have tons of choices for me to choose from, but I do expect the 1 or 2 choices they do have to be palatable. Particularly at a place the caliber of Rialto.

Not an opening or closing per se, but "House of Tibet Kitchen" on Holland in Somerville has a sign in their window advertising "Business for sale."

yep, i have (and many others). i just don't have the "veggie" burger making touch :(

I don't think you will (or should) get slammed for this suggestion. I have written about my love for Hillstone's veggie burger on this board before. In fact, I even tried to replicate it at home with disasterous results.

hi otter. no expectations here. i realize that the desire for a vegetarian ramen option is just a delusional pipe dream but so be it, i can dream!

yep, i was hoping for a vegetarian option myself-boo!

i am SUPER sad that the broth is pork-based and that there does not seem to be a vegetarian option-boo! :(

Yep, I also read the Globe article and was FREAKED OUT by the lard comment. What? For a moment there I believed my beloved cannolis might not be veggie friendly . Horror!

iYO Cafe in Davis Square is now open.

We fInally made it to Amsterdam last night. Used all of the "tricks" I learned on Chowhound while there: brought a piece of wax paper, removed one ball from pita so toppings would fit better, smashed other balls down into pita. Meanwhile, granola-guy is rolling his eyes at me (he is a BIG rule follower!). The falafel balls themselves were probably the best we have ever had. I liked the topping bar. We are kinda big food freshness and safety geeks and didn't find the bar offensive or unsanitary (as we all know food bars can sometimes be).

A few thoughts:
1) The falafel plate might benefit from the addition of lettuce. That way, you can at least pretend you are eating a "healthy" salad.

2) Diva should close and Amsterdam should expand into that space (ha, don't hate on me for saying that!).

Nice investigative work! I am (crossing my fingers) that they will have vegetarian ramen.

It looks like something is gearing up to open in the old Zing Pizza space (?). There are signs pasted all over the windows but they are written in Japanese and I am unable to read them!

Boo! Granolaguy and I were looking forward to meeting up with you but are heading out of town early for the long weekend. Please let us know about future events as we would love to join!

Granolaguy and I would like to see this film again and think it would be fun to join other Chowhounders for sushi. What show time will you be at and how do we go about meeting up?

Area Man-how very observant of you. Yep, I used to be a pescatarian but ~6 months ago returned to being a lacto-ovo vegetarian.

Bob Dobalina-unfortunately I have yet to discover any mind-blowing veggie Mexican food in the Boston area. Thankfully, Granolaguy is a motivated and creative cook and together we have perfected a few amazing Mexican veggie staples (delicious and full-bodied beans, Mexican rice, and grilled veggie tacos w/homemade corn tortillas). Granolaguy also recently returned from a trip to Tucson with a suitcase full of flour tortillas!

Emannths-I guess it would be nice to have at least one more veggie taco choice. Perhaps simply grilled veggies (onions, peppers, mushrooms, brussel sprouts, etc.), served with some sort of creative vegan sauce or with the option for cheese. I will certainly try their current veggie taco, but my concern (for them, not me) is that if their veggie options are limited, they may fail to draw in a veggie/vegan crowd. Or, if a veggie/vegan dislikes their meal, they will fail to return (since there will not be alternatives to try).

i have to say that i am pretty disappointed by the vegetarian options on the menu. while i see that there are several vegetarian snacks and appetizers, there is only one veggie taco (out of 10 available tacos) and 1 veggie entree (out of 7 total entrees). if you don't like nopales (i don't) or enchiladas (i don't), then you are SOL (i am).

granolaguy and i saw this documentary in thailand last month. it was interesting and i would certainly recommend it. funny (or not so funny) that one could see it in bangkok before boston. i imagine that in boston they probably won't make you stand before the show begins while the national anthem plays (with accompanying video montage of the king).

an interesting side note: the king of thailand was born at mt. auburn hospital in 1927.

we haven't had much luck at veggie galaxy.

1st visit: once seated, we told the waitress we only had ~1 hour for breakfast as we had theatre tickets. she indicated that this would not be a problem. we ordered and then waited.....waited.....waited for our food. other tables (that had sat down after us) were served. i reminded the waitress after ~35 minutes re: our time limit. she assured us that our food was coming out soon. waited.....waited.....waited. nothing. with 5 minutes left to go, we asked the waitress to cancel our order.
the bad: no food = hungry, cranky-pants theatre go-ers.
the good: they "comp'd" us the 2 coffees we drank.

2nd visit: seated at the "breakfast bar" we waited for our server. 20 minutes later (we timed it!), our server finally greeted us (absurd!). we ordered our food. thankfully, our food came out relatively quickly (~15 minutes). we only saw our server twice: once to order and once to receive the bill. we were served our food directly by the cook. this meant no water refills, no ability to make additional requests, etc. the food was okay. i liked the potato salad. the "burger" was decent (nothing special).
the bad: the unbelievable time it took to be greeted by our server. our server not checking-in with us at all during the meal.
the good: we got to eat food on this visit!

i saw a sign indicating that "panera bread" will be opening in the old bob slate space on mass. ave. boo! such a shame to both lose that bob slate AND have it replaced by panera. i bet they will make a killing though (across from harvard campus).

I walked by the "old" Pulse Cafe spot this evening. The windows are covered with newspaper. There is a sign announcing the upcoming arrival of "Palm Sugar Thai Cuisine."

update:

i reviewed aquacate verde here on chowhound on june 2, 2011. on this date i wrote:

"burritos: we always order veggie-they were not as big, the rice was more flavorful, the bean-to-rice ratio was off (way more rice than beans), and not as much avocado. everything tasted super fresh though and they were tasty (or at least tastier than anything else in town!)
[...]
if we were to instruct them re: our burrito-filling desires (1/2 beans, 1/2 rice, cheese, more avo), i think we would still believe that we were getting them from lupita!"

i would like to update this review (updated: 11/11/11):

as time has passed, aquacate verde becomes less and less "lupita-like" and more-and-more like all the other subpar boston taquerias. the last 2 times we have ordered our beloved veggie burritos, we have been sorely disappointed. these visits are documented below:

1) i ordered a veggie burrito. the owner informed me that they were out of avocados (what, doesn't this place have the word "avocado" in it's name? seriously, run down to shaws real quick and buy some!). the burrito was simply made of beans, rice, and cheese. it was bland, bland, and (did i mention this already?) bland. blech!

after this disheartening encounter, i accepted that you "can't go home" and vowed to never go there again.

2) my husband came home from the gym last night with a veggie burrito from aquacate verde (i hadn't told him of my new vow of aquacate "celebacy"). this time, the veggie burrito had:
a) beans (bland, not good);
b) rice (blah);
c) 1 small piece of avocado (small!);
and,
d) NO CHEESE!
ugh, it was awful! and to top it off, on the side came a small salsa that was a really FUNKY color and when my husband went to open it, it popped (like it was pressurized! it had obviously gone bad).

boo! this california gurl is deeply saddened by the loss of a great taqueria. lupita=RIP.

yes, i did recommend that they sell veggie pot stickers (and they seemed agreeable to looking into it).

i stopped by miso market last night to pick up a few things. on the list:

1) potstickers-nope, no vegetarian ones.

2) pickled ginger-nope, they had it (but did you know some of this stuff contains
aspartame? ugh!)

3) udon noodles-nope, in the freezer that had packs of 5 (but i only needed
one). the shelf stable udon they had contained msg!

so........i left empty-handed-boo! i guess i had this "misperception" that japanese food was healthy, but after reading the ingredients of many products, i realize that japanese packaged food is just like american packaged food (filled with bad things for me). sigh.........

p.s. my hubby and i have been buying this AMAZING tofu from whole foods that is made in somerville. it would be cool if miso market decided to stock as many local products as possible.

RAWBERTS-

"Buy With Me" has a deal for Rawbert's Organic Garden Cafe

You can choose:
1) $75- Participate in a raw food cooking class (up to $195 value)
2) $20-Gets you $40 worth of raw vegan food

http://www.buywithme.com/boston/deals...

I am SUPER INTERESTED to find out if anyone has particated in one of these raw food cooking classes as I am interested in learning more about "cooking" raw food (ha!), but have been unable to find reviews re: the classes at Rawberts.

.......and hopefully the last!

just what we need, another sub-par, cookie-cutter, chain (panera, opened this morning in porter square):

(article in the globe: if you are able to access it):
http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/c...

ugh!

hee-hee! touche! (on the salsa comment).

granola-guy and i FINALLY went to our much loved lupita (now: aguacate verde) last night for take-out. here's the scoop:

STILL THE SAME:

the menu above the counter.

beverage cases.

tables.

(looks just like the old lupita inside).

DIFFERENT:

sign on the front of building.

staff (it was strange to walk in and not see the 2 women we have become accustomed to).

warmer reception (not effusive, but certainly a little more smiley and gracious).

burritos: we always order veggie-they were not as big, the rice was more flavorful, the bean-to-rice ratio was off (way more rice than beans), and not as much avocado. everything tasted super fresh though and they were tasty (or at least tastier than anything else in town!). they also put our 2 burritos into 2 bags (rather than 1), and gave us each a green salsa (thank god they got rid of that nasty red one!)

we ONLY have ever gotten the veggie burrito's and definately see a difference. next time, if we were to instruct them re: our burrito-filling desires (1/2 beans, 1/2 rice, cheese, more avo), i think we would still believe that we were getting them from lupita!

The hubbie and I had afternoon tea at The Taj just a couple of weekends ago. He had never been to afternoon tea before and I wanted him to experience what it is all about (e.g. little crustless sammies-aka: sandwiches, etc.). I had done a bunch of research re: Boston afternoon teas and The Taj seemed to get the best reviews. So off we went! The room was nice but we were placed at a table right next to the violinist, but I had to ask to be moved (as there was a draft on that table and it was a cold, snowy day in Boston-brrr....). The service was less-than-wonderful (abrupt/rushed) and the tea was not hot enough, although the food was all quite tasty (not the most amazing I have ever had, but there was nothing that we really disliked). We both got an order of the sammies and sweets (although could have easily "shared" one order, rather than gorged on two). The sammies were okay (we didn't scream in ecstasy), and definitely overpriced, while the sweets left me in a sugar coma (there were a lot!). All in all, a pretty "good" afternoon tea, although certainly not remarkable. A solid B-